FAU Graduate Students Work with Palm Beach High School Students to Enhance Science Education through ChemBOND:The Next Generation

Dr. Donna Chamely-Wiik, principal investigator (standing) works with teachers and the first cohort of FAU graduate students during a two-week instructional and organizational workshop before the students enter high school classrooms for the first time this August.

In a major effort to improve science education at the high school level and stimulate students’ interest in potential careers in science, FAU, in collaboration with the School District of Palm Beach County, has been awarded a five-year grant for $2.6 million from the National Science Foundation’s GK-12 program for a project titled, “Project ChemBOND (Building Opportunities for Networking and Discussion): The Next Generation.” Graduate students in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) disciplines will acquire additional skills that will broadly prepare them for professional and scientific careers and offer them an opportunity to work with high school teachers in the classroom to enhance science education. For the high school students, the project will offer more exciting ways to study chemistry. MORE...

FAU Libraries’ Arthur and Mata Jaffe Center for Book Arts is hosting “Paradox Swamp: Beauty, Obsession and a Strange Green Land,” an exhibition of artists’ books, fine press books, Florida maps and other Floridiana, and textiles and artifacts from the Seminole and Miccosukee tribes through Wednesday, Sept. 5, at the S.E. Wimberly Library on the Boca Raton campus.

The Jaffe Center selected the exhibition’s name, “Paradox Swamp: Beauty, Obsession and a Strange Green Land,” from a passage in The Orchid Thief, a 1998 national best seller by Susan Orlean, which is set in South Florida. The exhibition helps to launch the 2007 Freshman Reading Project, which selected Orlean’s book. Orlean will also speak at FAU's inaugural Freshman Convocation on Aug. 26.

The exhibition is on display in the library’s main lobby, at the entrance to the second floor administrative offices and at the Jaffe Center on the third floor. Click for library hours or call 561-297-3770. The portion of the exhibition at the Jaffe Center may be viewed Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. or by appointment.

To arrange a group tour of the exhibition, contact John Cutrone, Arthur and Mata Jaffe Center for Book Arts programs coordinator, at 561-297-0455 or jcutrone@fau.edu.

Heart Walk 2007 Slated for Saturday, Sept 29.

Join President Brogan, the honorary chair, and FAU family and friends for the American Heart Association's South Palm Beach Chapter Heart Walk 2007 to be held on the Boca Raton campus. Breakfast and activities will take place from 7 to 9 a.m.; the walk begins at 9 a.m. For more information, contact Gisele Galoustian at ext. 7-2010 or ggaloust@fau.edu.

FAU Receives
Diversity in Athletics Award

Fall Sports to be Highlighted at FanFest

FanFest starts at noon on Saturday, Aug. 18 on the Tom Oxley Football practice fields. The event, which is free and open to the public, will feature FAU's fall sports teams, an entertainment area for children and the football team's first scrimmage of the fall.

Season and single game tickets for FAU football are now available at fausports.com
or by calling the
FAU ticket office at
1-866-FAU-Owls.

FAU has received a 2006-07 Diversity in Athletics Award from the Laboratory for Diversity in Sport at Texas A&M University. FAU was recognized in the category titled “Employee Values and Attitudes.”

Since 2000, researchers at Texas A&M have been studying the effects that diversity has on the overall performance of athletics departments at universities around the country. They recently announced that they found a strong correlation between a successfully applied diversity strategy and outstanding competitive performance.

The NCAA News reported earlier this year that researchers George B. Cunningham and Mike Sagas “have found that athletics departments that excel in diversity strategy tend to register higher point totals in the U.S. Sports Academy Directors’ Cup, administered by the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics.” In a survey that tracked both factors, schools that scored high in overall diversity scored an average of more than 250 points higher on the Directors’ Cup performance scale than schools reporting low diversity.

Thirty high school students (right) from throughout South Florida recently spent eight days on the Boca Raton campus participating in a variety of academic enrichment activities as part of the College Reach-Out Program (CROP). The program, coordinated by the Office of Multicultural Affairs, includes academic and career workshops, the College Life Skill Course and college admission and financial aid presentations designed to prepare students for higher education. It was offered in collaboration with the Rise Consortium, which includes Broward Community College, Florida Atlantic University, Indian River Community College and Palm Beach Community College. The FAU program, funded by the Florida Department of Education, prepares more than 70, low-income, first-generation and minority students for college throughout the year. Click for more information.

Donation to Support Italian Studies, Opera

The department of languages, linguistics and comparative literature in the Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters recently received two donations from Il Circolo for further development of the University’s Italian studies program. The organization donated $10,000 for the Italian language program to be used for study abroad scholarships and for an annual Italian conference, and $3,000 for development of the opera program.

Il Circolo, an Italian expression that means “the circle,” is a Palm Beach County-based organization dedicated to developing an awareness of Italian culture and supporting Italian culture and arts. The organization’s recent donation to FAU is the latest in a 21-year relationship between Il Circolo and the University.

Until now , Il Circolo has supported FAU solely in Italian language studies. This donation to the music program is an effort to encourage development of the opera program, which has grown with the support of internationally-known opera star and FAU graduate Dean Peterson. A student in the program, Matt Daniels, recently won the Sarasota Opera competition.

“FAU is able to offer Italian studies in a variety of disciplines and to showcase Italian culture to the community through opera performances and an annual conference,” said Dr. James Guttoso, president of Il Circolo.

For more information about FAU’s Italian studies or music programs, call 561-297-3860.

Training for New BANNER Student
Information System Coming Soon

The University is making strong progress toward implementation of the new BANNER student information system, which is scheduled to replace the current OASIS system beginning with the registration of new students in October. The new system is designed to provide many benefits to users. It will be based on local servers and will be available 24 hours a day, unlike OASIS, which goes down for maintenance every night. The new interface is web-based and more user friendly than the text-based screens of OASIS.

Supervisory personnel have been asked to submit the names of staff members who will need to get BANNER training before the system “goes live.” The following information should be sent to Bannertrnsec@fau.edu for all persons requiring this training:

Name
Position Title
Email address
Telephone number
Banner General Navigation Completed? yes or no
Banner General Student Access? yes or no

Thanks to everyone for cooperating throughout this conversion process.

State of the University Address Slated for Wednesday Sept. 19 at 10 a.m.

President Brogan will deliver the 2007 State of the University Address on Wednesday, Sept. 19, at 10 a.m. in the University Theatre, Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters. Everyone is invited to attend the address and the reception that will follow.

MacArthur Campus Library Gallery Seeks 'Sunshine Shorts' Entries

The John D. MacArthur Campus Library Gallery is extending a call to artists for its annual “Sunshine Shorts: An All Florida Film Festival,” which will be held in October on the Jupiter campus.
The juried festival is open to all Florida film, video and conceptual artists, including students of all ages. The Viewer’s Choice Award, the Juror’s Choice Award and the FAU Outstanding Student Award will be given. Students must identify their schools.

Projects must be 10 minutes or less in length. Deadline for submission is Aug. 25. Entries received after that will be held for next year. There are no application or entry fees.

Send a copy of your DVD in National Television System Committee (NTSC) format with one to three sentences that can be used on the web, the running time of your project and your mailing address to John D. MacArthur Campus Library, Florida Atlantic University, 5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter, FL 33458. Attention: Diane Arrieta/Film Festival. Videos not selected will be sent back to the artist if a self-addressed, stamped envelope is included with the entry.

Donna CooperDonna Cooper, who spent 22 years at FAU working on the Boca Raton and Jupiter campuses, passed away on July 15 at the age of 60.

Donna joined the Controller's Office in 1985 and worked there for 18 years before transferring to the College of Business on the Jupiter campus. Last year, she returned to the Boca Raton campus to become a program assistant in the dean's office of the Barry Kaye College of Business.

Donna is survived by her husband, John; two daughters, Bonnie Kovac and Lisa Smith; and three grandchildren, Joshua Kovac and Gregory and Amber Smith.

Dr. Robert StetsonDr. Robert Stetson, a founding faculty member of FAU’s physics department who retired several years ago, died in June at the age of 75.

An authority on electron physics, Dr. Stetson joined the FAU faculty in August of 1964, two months before the University opened its doors to students. During his long career at FAU, he served in a wide variety of positions, including director of the South Regional Center for Excellence in Mathematics, Science, Computers and Technology, director of sponsored research, director of the Faculty Scholars Program, acting dean of undergraduate studies, and special assistant to the vice present for academic affairs for lower-division planning.

Dr. Stetson was highly instrumental in expanding FAU to a full, four-year institution after the Florida Legislature authorized the University to begin accepting freshmen and sophomores. He led the effort to develop the lower-division curriculum and to recruit and advise students who wanted to enter FAU at the lower-division level. This change was put into effect in 1984.

Dr. Stetson was divorced from retired FAU faculty member Dr. Dorothy McBride. The Physics Department is planning to hold a memorial service for Dr. Stetson on Friday, Sept. 7, at 2 p.m. in the Grand Palm Room of the Student Union. For more information, please call Debra Littell at 7-3380.